To mark the centenary of World War One, Radio National hosts a series of special broadcasts. The Great War: 10 Contested Questions explores 10 critical questions about the war:
1. The Contested Beginning: Presents the various theories about how it all started.
2. Lions and Donkeys: How accurate is the view that the General Staff in WW1 were bumbling incompetents, out of touch with the reality of the trenches and unable to comprehend the destruction that awaited?
3. Sideshows: Entente commanders believed the war would be decided on the Western Front and that everything else was a 'sideshow', but the Great War also raged in Italy, Austria, Palestine, Turkey and New Guinea. How important were these theatres of war to the outcome of the conflict?
4. The Enemy Within: Anarchists, syndicalists, Marxists, Christian pacifists, nationalists, women's groups and intellectuals all opposed the war and conscription. So were the soldiers at the front let down by some of the people at home?
5. Hell and Healing: Industrial warfare forced doctors and nurses to find new ways to treat the wounded, maimed and psychologically damaged. What insights did the war give us into human suffering and how have future generations benefited from this?
6. The Pen and the Sword: In his analysis of Great War literature, literary historian Paul Fussell argues that irony was the predominant literary response to the horrors of war. How important is this literature to the way we remember the war today?
7. The View from Berlin: Did Germany engineer the war for its own territorial ambitions or was it a victim of the complicated diplomatic web that bound it to an unstable Hapsburg empire?
8. God and Country: The Great War was a test of faith like no other before or since. What part did religion play in the war and what impact did the conflict have on belief? Was Christian Europe a casualty of war?
9. Other Voices, Other Battles: Could the Entente powers have survived at the front without the assistance of troops and workers from colonised nations?
10. Endgame: The Hundred Days offensive brought an end to the stalemate in the trenches and saw the collapse of the Central Powers. Should the allies have occupied Germany at the end of the War and if they had, could they have prevented WW2?
By:
ABC Radio Imprint: ABC/ Bolinda Audio Country of Publication: Australia Edition: Unabridged Dimensions:
Height: 134mm,
Width: 146mm,
Spine: 28mm
Weight: 239g ISBN:9781486292936 ISBN 10: 1486292933 Publication Date:01 April 2015 Audience:
General/trade
,
ELT Advanced
Format:CD-Audio Publisher's Status: Active